The shockerDrone; a shocking mod for the AR Drone

You’ve all seen taser like devices built from disposable cameras. We have seen them mounted to rubber gloves, finger tips, even potato gun ammo! We had not yet seen them on a quadcopter. This was quickly remedied once we had one to play with. Meet the shockerDrone, a Parrot AR Drone with built in shocker attachment.

To add the shocker attachment, we had to reduce weight as much as possible. To do this, all stickers and extra material was removed from the “indoor” hull of the AR Drone. We chose the indoor version because it has this night light frame that extends out past the blades to protect them. This was perfect for allowing it to bump into people.

We then made two tracks with aluminum tape around the entire hull. These were connected with wire directly to the capacitor in a disposable camera. Another weight reduction was to remove all extraneous pieces of the camera. Not only did this make it lighter, but it allowed the entire circuit to be hidden inside the hull. Only a little bit of carving was necessary to make enough space.

As you can see in the video, it does supply a shock, but not a strong enough one to knock you down. Our brave subject [Jared] got hit a few times and seemed to survive the ordeal. Then again, he’s an electrician and has probably had worse at his day job. I accidentally cradled it in my arm thinking it was discharged and ended up with a full and fairly prolonged discharge that broke the skin. You can see a picture of that down below.

I had an idea that a fun game would be “grab the dollar bill off of the shockerDrone”, but the AR Drone isn’t quite as nimble as some other devices we’ve seen and people were able to just snatch the dollar bill without much chance of being shocked.

That is until the PArents sew the living hell out of you. personally I’d rather take an actual tasers battery and hook it up. Give them a real shock. Of course if I were designing something like this it would be using either a 22mm piston or a ranger taser like setup.

I’ve been waiting for this since the talk about it on Twitter! Looks like fun. What if instead of a foil lining around the edge, you had long, flexible wires coming from the bottom of the drone hanging down. It’d be like a jelly fish. Probably much easier to catch someone that way.

Interesting idea, but one drawback. you will get to shock many people just once. At the next fly by they will grab the tentacles, and make away with your drone. Even if it’s a true tazer grabbing a handful of wire will short out the tazer cu rent. The widow of opportunity might be short, but many would go for it Far out ideas all the same.

Dunno. Seems like it might develop into something which could serve as a less lethal method of looter control — while a rifle round is both cheaper and more effective, I suppose that sort of thing discomfits some folks enough to give something like this a purpose.

This, is pretty awesome. If you wanted to use this for security purposes you could load it with a UV dye sprayer, mark a suspect/trespasser/burglar, the security personnel or police could look for that specific dye. There types that are like permanent marker and bond permanently to organic fabrics and skin.

As even if “there’s an earlier” one- My example being “Rover” from TV show “The Prisoner” as a drone that can make you go down and stay down..non-lethally.

That last point being the one that could keep you from hearing “Will the Defendant please rise” being directed at YOU. Unlike many other Dangerous Hacks- this one has the risk multiplier set to Infinity by being free flying and a contact risk. IF it had a safety relay requiring receipt of two or more control signals= one to open up a shunting crowbar relay and the second one being B+ to the shocker? Then it goes from unthinkably stupidly risky to merely damned dangerous. If things Fubar, at least you’ve shown due diligence.

We’re Hackers- We’ve accepted that we do STUPIDLY dangerous things for the sake of art or whatever. Not so with the mundanes all around us. Not to be a buzzkill- but the buzz from one of these could kill a person with oh- pacemakers or medical conditions.

Seriously folks- For DARWIN’s sake.. this is a Hackery to keep confined in spaces with only witting and comprehending the risks participants at risk.

IF one of us screws up and causes even a “Reportable Incident” we’re all going to be placed at risk of that Legal BanHammer coming down on much we take for granted as fair for our play! The outlawing of electric copters is not unthinkable if someone dies- it could be GAME OVER for a lot of what we do. IF it hurts a mundane bystander- they could own your Hackerspace or just your luckless tailfeathers.

If you think me Paranoid?? Can you say BuckyBalls?

All that said-

This is a really worthy Hack even if it’s scary for the tragically wrong risks. Play safely- Be Careful, but not Too Careful may apply IN the Hackerspace. but among the mundanes- we’ve got to be smarter than they are kthks.

I do believe i suggested this very thing on
here about a week ago, when they asked how would one arm a ar.drone. Glad to see they chose my idea
over some of the less.. realistic.. suggestions, which had obvious weight issues.

It would have been better to use the guts from an actual cheap-o taser, so the shock could be administered continuously, but it’s still funny.

Please, send video of you asking your unsuspecting friends to “catch” the drone for you. :-)